Hot Air & Patriotic Gobbeldygook
by bj
Summary: The five pages must be written--come Limp Bizkit or melted ice cream. An Annie Wright story.


Disclaimer: Annie isn't mine, for heaven's sake! If you want to pay for this, pay NBC or Adam Sorkin.  
  
Author's Note: Thanks to all the reviewers who asked for more. I would've written it anyway, but it's nice to know you care:).  
  
Hot Air & Patriotic Gobbledygook  
By BJ Garrett  
  
My answering machine was blinking when I came home, and it's still blinking as I step out of the bathroom, trailing steam, an hour later. I should be typing furiously, attempting my five-page homework assignment, but I'm not. I'm trying to relax and not get homicidal.  
  
The message--or three, now that I look at the display--is probably from Patrice. I was shell-shocked and vague at lunch today, after showing up in the mess half an hour late. Of course, I walked in just as Patrice did. She isn't particularly punctual, but I am unfailingly on time. Except for today.  
  
I'm sure my mother also phoned. I left her a message on Sunday night after I got back from work to tell her about my promotion. She probably just got home to hear it. My mother travels a lot. My dad used to say excessively, but then they got divorced and he really doesn't care how much she travels anymore.  
  
Anyway, I'm not checking my messages yet tonight. I'm going to eat now that it's well past the normal human digestive prime time. It's about nine. Something wholesome and conducive to mental activity. Something that isn't tuna. Or salmon. I'm not a big fan of fish. My cupboards are bare. I swear rather loudly, just because I'm hungry and there's no one around to feed me.  
  
So I grab a spoon and a pint bucket of Haagen-Dazs from the freezer and sit at my computer, still wrapped in my mint-coloured terry cloth robe. Ignoring the e-mail icon, I go immediately to my word processor--no, I open up my CD player and turn on some Fleetwood Mac. A couple of seconds into "Gold Dust Woman," I change my mind and switch to Dvorak. Nothing snaps the neurons like "The New World."  
  
Now I open the word processor. I haven't made any notes, which is typically not me, but when stating something as subjective as one's personal worth, I think it's best to fly by the seat of one's pants.  
  
Staring at the screen, I get lost in the music for a while, and resurface at ten o'clock. I'm really quite stupid. Dvorak is gone, definitely. I select Limp Bizkit and begin again.  
  
For some reason my thoughts and words as they pour (or trickle) onto the screen become increasingly violent. Shaking my head, I make them disappear with a point and squeak of the mouse. Flaccid Cookie also makes an exit.  
  
No music. Just the words in my head and my fingers on the keyboard.  
  
Why should I get to be important?  
  
Sam said that I'm just as important as I want to be. Mr. Ziegler seems to think otherwise.  
  
What is the place of Annie Wright in the genesis of a new America?  
  
Slaving in the office kitchenette? Watching from the back of a staff meeting? Or more?  
  
Whoa, girl, let's start small.  
  
'I took a job in the Bartlet Administration because I believed that I, as a card-holding American citizen of some reasonable intelligence, had the chance and the duty to make a difference.'  
  
That's a pretty good start. A firm, if digressive, statement of purpose. A thesis, if you will. What's next? Make a difference in what?  
  
'My senior professor of Global Economics told me that working the White House would ensure the utilisation of my potential to be a great economist. Three weeks into my employment as office staff, I wondered where the spreadsheet opportunities were in printer cartridge replacement. My gut told me there were none, and that I was making it possible for the people with experience to get their jobs done. My gut told me that I was greasing the wheels of democracy by ensuring the senior staff had clean coffee cups.'  
  
Okay. I'm doing a decent job of screening my bitterness. Besides, what have I got to be bitter about? The days of shredder and recycling bins are over. Samoses has brought me to the promised land: single-occupant cubicalcy and my very own phone.  
  
He did say I could have an office.  
  
'So, for two years my sweat assisted in lubricating our system of government.'  
  
Blinking, I lean away from the screen. "What a stupid thing to say."  
  
Maybe I shouldn't try to write this tonight. But when will I write it? My pinkie presses firmly on the backspace key and that god-awful sentence disappears.  
  
I think back to Friday, when I was so full of indignation and anger that I was willing to give up on President Bartlet so I wouldn't have to accept humiliation. Chuckling to myself, I remember Sam's face when he realised what exactly office staff do besides bustle and look pretty.  
  
Holy cats, it's almost eleven. Hustle, kid, hustle. I bend over the keyboard and search the screen as if it is some glaring LCD of my brain, capable of displaying every subconscious thought and brilliant phrase.  
  
Brilliance.  
  
I want to prove that I'm smart.  
  
'I deserve to be something more than the replacer of ink cartridges because I am a reasonably intelligent American citizen. I survived public school and state university. I am a child of the government, and I must ensure that the government continues to improve their parenting skills for the generations to come.'  
  
The part of me that isn't involved in this passionate exposition blinks and says, Wow. My fingers keep flying over the keys. I'm starting to mutter as I type so I don't forget what I was saying.  
  
'There is a place for everyone, and there's always a way to improve one's place. I've outgrown my place as office staff. I'm so much more than that now. I may never have taken a class in public speaking, but who needs to speak when they can write? I may never have written a speech in my life, but isn't America about doing what you know you can even if you've never done it before?'  
  
Pulling out the patriotism. Good for me.  
  
'For some people working in the White House, it is only a pit stop on the road to bigger things. I can tell you right now that if I'm appreciated and allowed to blossom into the brilliant human being I'm so ready to be, I'm a lifetime staffer. I'll stick with the President until the bitter end.'  
  
I can see myself delivering this speech to Mr. Ziegler. I'm gesturing and enunciating and emphasising. God, it's beautiful.  
  
'I may not have the piece of paper that says I'm a bona fidey speechwriter, but who does? Writing a moving speech is more than putting words on paper, it is the science, and the art, of placing meaning on those words, and conveying the dedication of the speaker through them. Not everyone can do it, but I can.  
  
'Since I was a child I've dreamed of being somebody important, of having influence and the power to help the world become a better place. In Josiah Bartlet's White House, I believed I had the opportunity to do that. Sadly, I recently came to the realisation that one cannot wait around for fate to hand them greatness, but must search it out. I was prepared to walk away from the White House in that journey, but was told by another reasonably intelligent human being that the path existed within the administration, I just had to walk it without fear.'  
  
My right hand cramps and I stop for a moment. This is pretty good, I must admit. I hope I can keep this up for two-and-a-half more pages. That's all I need. The pail of ice cream is melting on the desk beside me, and my stomach is growling. Taking a moment to walk out the ache in my shoulders, I pick the HD up and pitch it into the trashcan from the living room. The phone catches my eye and I pick it up, dialling my favourite late-night pizza place.  
  
"Hello, it's Annie Wright at the Atlantic Arms," I tell the bored-sounding order boy.  
  
"Hi, Ms. Wright," he replies on a yawn. "What are you doing up this late?"  
  
"Working. I got a promotion and I have to prove myself."  
  
I can't hear him nod, but I assume he does. "Congratulations. What'll it be tonight?"  
  
I would imagine most people who regularly phone out for pizza between eight and twelve o'clock at night have a 'usual.' I'm different.  
  
"You got a number 42?" I ask.  
  
"Yep."  
  
"Send it over. Large."  
  
"That'll be twenty-two-fifty. You want the six pack too?" I can hear his nearly empty Bic scratching on the carbon-copy pad.  
  
"No. That much Coke will just keep me awake."  
  
"Great. Tammy'll be over in about half an hour. Don't work to hard." He laughs at his own joke.  
  
"Goodnight. I won't." As I put the phone down I reach for my purse to make sure I have enough to cover the pizza. Two crisp twenties greet my eyes as I open my wallet, as well as a note from Patrice. That sneak. She must have put it in there while I was getting my lunch this afternoon.  
  
'Hey kid,' it says in her familiar loopy writing, 'Your meeting obviously bushed you, so I'll write this down to make sure you get it. I've got a job offer up at Georgetown, TA for a Sociology professor. I don't know if I'll take it, but if I tell Mr. Lyman I am, maybe he'll give me a promotion ;). Anyway, hon, never say never and I'll talk to you later. Luv, Homey P.'  
  
I giggle at her signature. We'd gone to the Hallowe'en party as gangsta rappers last year and called each other Straight-A and Homey P ever since. Then the real message of her note hits my sleep- and food-deprived brain.  
  
That insane little Bostonian. The note is carefully replaced in my purse. I'm not in any state to react right now. I probably should have checked my messages when I got home. I should have paid more attention at lunch.  
  
How can she leave me?  
  
Well, really, we don't even work in the same room anymore. We don't even have the same boss. How can I expect her to hang around being glorified custodial staff when I'm movin' on up and she's got seniority?  
  
The computer screen's glare and my warm keyboard offer no comfort. I sit on the couch to wait for my pizza, which will hopefully revive me enough to finish my speech. I don't want to--  
  
Who cares what I don't want!  
  
Who cares what I'm qualified to do, or not!  
  
Who cares about seniority and speeches and staff!  
  
Against my will, and my common sense, I'm doubled over with my hands over my head, bawling my eyes out. I gasp and hiccup, the tears streaming down my face.  
  
The worst part is not the fact that I hardly ever cry, but that it seems like I'm crying over nothing. My inner shrink calmly says, 'You feel as though your ambition has taken over your life, when in fact you are only now discovering ambition. It has been one week and eleven hours since your realisation that you're merely an extra in the greater drama of the Chosen Ones, and not even one week since you were allowed to miles closer to their ranks than you ever dreamed. Despite your great belief in yourself, you never had the confidence that you could become any more than office staff, but now you have the chance, and it's resting on five pages of hot air and patriotic gobbledygook--and the opinion of a man you've been told many times is ruthless and merciless. Anyone would be afraid.'  
  
But Sam's not merciless--or ruthless, to the best of my knowledge. He gave me this chance. He expects me to write five pages and knock Mr. Ziegler's socks off. He probably has money riding on this. I look up and there sits the computer, not really glaring so much as glowing. I can make out the odd word or two on the screen, and they make me proud to work in the White House, no matter what I do. Slowly, I stand and approach my desk, wanting more than anything to finish my speech and show Patrice, and Sam, and Mr. Ziegler that it's possible for an extra to get lines.  
  
No, no, backspace. I want to show myself.  
  
THE END  



End file.
